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From: crichard@eecs.wsu.edu (richardson craig s    - CS500)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.games
Subject: Re: football (Professional Football Simulation)
Message-ID: <1990Nov14.184841.28555@eecs.wsu.edu>
Date: 14 Nov 90 18:48:41 GMT
References: <10992@milton.u.washington.edu> <1990Nov13.053257.7204@cbnewsd.att.com>
Reply-To: crichard@yoda.UUCP (richardson craig s    - CS500)
Organization: Washington State University, Pullman
Lines: 61

In article <1990Nov13.053257.7204@cbnewsd.att.com> rios@cbnewsd.att.com (Michael "Huh?" Rios) writes:
>In article <10992@milton.u.washington.edu>, dlarson@blake.u.washington.edu (Dale Larson) writes:
>> Does anyone have (or have seen) "Pro Football Simulation"  I'd never
>> heard of it, but ran across it in a current BriWall ad.
>> --
>> -Dale Larson  (dlarson@blake.u.washington.edu)
>
>I bought _Professional_Football_Simulation_ (MicroSearch, Inc.) back in
>January of this year, and I've had great fun with it.  The program itself
>has a tendency to lock up and play erratically, though...not very
>nice for the Amiga owner.  When it does run, the gameplay is incredible.
>You can specify offense and defense down to the man, and weather
>conditions do play a role in a game in an outdoor stadium.  Write back
>for more info.

I bought PFS directly from MicroSearch about a month after it came out, when it
developed that none of the local (Seattle area) dealers I visited had ever 
heard of it...  I called them up at 5:30 (Austin? TX time), and the *President
of the Company* answered the phone, answered all my questions very politely,
and *took an order*.  Needless to say, I was very impressed with the way they
do business...

And when I got the game, I saw nothing to change my mind.  I had spent a lot of
time with _Head_Coach_, their previous football game (PFS is essentially
HC 2.0), and PFS was even more excellent.

PFS comes with a set of predesigned teams and playbooks, which you can use to
play and learn the system, plus you have the ability to design both your own
teams (11 ratings per player) and playbooks (assignments for every player -
zone/man/mixed coverages, blitzes, "shooting the gaps" plus you can place any
player anywhere on the field (on defense), not just in a standard 4-3 or 3-4).
on offense, you have complete control over blocking, running to any hole, and
a completely arbitrary passing tree (you can design pass routes "on the fly").

I haven't played it too much, since I left my manual at home and can't access
the program due to copy protection, but I understand that it's not very
forgiving about disk changes (like Earl Weaver Baseball, it'll guru if the 
wrong disk is in the drive).  Also, at least one of the bugs in Head Coach
wasn't nailed down, and will cause a crash during play (I don't remember
exactly what, though :( ).

In short, I think it's definitely the best football game around for the Amiga,
but I'm reserving final judgement until the time (possibly never) when some of
the other football games (John Madden, etc.) are ported over...

Any _Head_Coach_ or _Pro_Football_Simulator_ coaches who lasted this far:
	Do you have any Team/Playbook/Game Plan files you'd like to trade?
the computer opponent with the standard ones tends to get pretty boring...

Disclaimer: I have no connection with MicroSearch except that I spend entirely
too much time playing their football games...

>Mike Rios		AT&T Secret Police		att!ihlpb!mrios

--Craig Richardson

-- 
*****   If Indiana Jones were a Computer Science professor...   *****
"He speaks twelve programming languages.  He knows _all_ the local
operating systems.  He'll blend in.  With any luck, he's probably
FTP'ed the Grail already..."